The focus of Dr. Berman’s lecture centered on the story of Air Force General Wesley Carter, who had shared with Berman the details of airplanes used by the Air Force Reserve after the war in Vietnam. Thirty-four U.S. Air Force MC-123 aircraft, used in Vietnam from 1961-71, had carried herbicides and insecticides used to defoliate the jungles of Vietnam. They were then returned to the United States for the Air Force Reserve to use from 1971-82. Many of the pilots and mechanics who ﬂew the planes in the United States became ill with diseases such as leukemia, non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and cancers of the larynx, lungs, and prostate.

Berman was then asked to investigate the connection between the planes and the personnel associated with them. What he discovered was that the planes were scrubbed by hand with dish soap after the planes returned to the United States. Nine years after their use in Vietnam, the planes had high levels of the toxins still clinging to the insides of the planes.

“Patches” came back to the U.S. in 1972, and served in the Air Force Reserve as a C-123K until it was retired to the National Museum of the United States Air Force in 1980. (U.S. Air Force photo)

One such plane, Patches, was ﬁnally retired to the U.S. Air Force Museum at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio and was deemed so highly contaminated that no one was allowed near it.

Incredibly, many of the U.S. personnel who ﬂew or maintained these planes were denied medical coverage or beneﬁts because they “did not have boots on the ground in Vietnam.” The exposures have been carried through to these men and women’s children and grandchildren.